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It seems that Panasonic, the archrival of Sony Corp. will be forming a fusion with Sanyo to obtain its green energy products, such as rechargeable batteries. However, Panasonic has no plans to change to names again to something like "Pananyo" or "Sansonic", even though Panasonic had not too long ago changed its name from Matsushita to the current Panasonic. Apparently, the name Matsushita was known in the line of rice cookers. It goes by National.

New Delhi (Nov 19, 2008): An Indian naval vessel, the INS Tabar, sank a suspected pirate "mother ship" in the Gulf of Aden and chased two attack boats into the night, officials said today.

Such mother ships — usually converted trawlers — are often used to take gangs of pirates and smaller attack boats into deep water, and can be used as mobile bases to attack merchant vessels.

"Pirates were seen roaming on the upper deck of this vessel with guns and rocket-propelled grenade launchers," said a statement from the Indian navy. It said that the pirates fired on the INS Tabar after the officers asked to search it.

Indian forces fired back, sparking fires and a series of onboard blasts — possibly due to exploding ammunition — and destroying the ship. They chased one of two speedboats shadowing the larger ship. One was later found abandoned. The other escaped, according to the statement.

Separate bands of pirates also seized a Thai ship with 16 crew members and an Iranian cargo vessel with a crew of 25 in the Gulf of Aden, where Somalia-based pirates appear to be attacking ships at will, said Mr Noel Choong of the International Maritime Bureau's piracy reporting centre in Malaysia.

"It's getting out of control," Mr Choong said.

The clash happened as pirates claimed to begin negotiations over a ransom for a Saudi supertanker that was seized on Sunday (Nov 16), outside of sea lanes patrolled by warships from several navies. The Sirius Star — as large as an aircraft carrier and capable of carrying a quarter of Saudi Arabia's daily oil output — is the biggest ship ever to be hijacked by pirates.

- TIMES ONLINE, BBC NEWS, AP

Whatever happened to the good ol' days of "yo, ho, ho and a bottle of rum"?

Considering that the case is still under investigation, it is still too early to link it with the pension records. However, it is vital that the Japanese government should prevent a possible third occurrence. These sort of actions can be considered as "despicable".

ASTRONAUTS have fixed a urine-recycling unit on the International Space Station, needed to support a six-person crew at the research outpost next year.

The mission of the US space shuttle Endeavour was extended by one day to fix the machine, which is designed to convert urine into drinking water. The equipment had failed several times since it was delivered a week ago. The shuttle is now due to return to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Sunday (Nov 30) after 16 days in orbit.

"Not to spoil anything, but I think up here the appropriate words are 'Yippee!'," space station Commander Mike Fincke told mission control early on Tuesday morning (Nov 25).

No one in his right mind would want to tolerate that. But, what are you going to do? Martial law all around the world or answer their demands so that they can ask even more? Most of these terrorists are using the things that the western countries create and sell, within their laws, to improve their own lifestyles (look at French and their weapon selling business with the African warlords, the buyer being a government does not make it any rightful or moral). Anyways, since the interest of the civilization won't change, side-effects will be there too. And, it is really sad that the people who will be affected by these actions are the ones that really don't have anything to do with what is going on, or have a say to trigger any change.

Update on the Mumbai attacks. As of now (1640 GMT, Nov 27), CNN estimates 125 deaths and more than 300 wounded. The Indian security forces are apparently preparing to make a final attack on the attackers in the Oberoi-Trident hotel.

The assailants call themselves the Deccan Mujahideen, a previously unheard of group. The men are of South Asian appearance and reportedly speak Hindi, indicating they originated in India. More interestingly, it appears that Indian security forces have captured at least one of them, so we may be getting more details on who these people really are, and more importantly, where they've launched their attacks from.

The language that Indian Prime Minister Mamohan Singh has been using is itself interesting. He has said that the attacks originate from a neighbouring country (contrary to what security forces on the ground are saying, see above paragraph), but stopped short of naming just which country that is. Of course, everyone knows he is referring to Pakistan, but it's still early days, so India is taking care to not point fingers without strong evidence.

For its part, Pakistan has already strongly condemned the attacks, and promises to do whatever it can to tackle "a common enemy", not just of India and Pakistan, but of the world.

It is also important to note that Pakistan is not the only possible origin of the attacks. Other militant groups hostile to India are known to operate from Bangladesh.

People are understandably asking if Al-Qaeda is involved. So far, no such signs. It's more likely, however, that the immediate impetus is domestic, rather than international. Indian parliamentary elections are ongoing at the moment, so these attacks may have been deliberately planned to disrupt the process. At the very least, they have as good as shut down Mumbai, the financial hub of India, so that in itself will most certainly affect the rest of the country.